Hi, I’m Vicki Shaw.

For most of my life, I followed the rules. The ones I inherited from my parents, who immigrated to the U.S. from China, in search of stability. The ones society told me would lead to success—get good grades, build the perfect resume, find the right career. And for a while, it worked. I checked every box.

But something felt off.

I started noticing the invisible fences that shaped my world—the rules I had never questioned, the values I had absorbed without realizing it. And once I saw them, I couldn’t unsee them.

In 2023, I quit my corporate tech job, and I started asking bigger questions.

What if the rules we live by aren’t as solid as they seem? What if we’ve inherited values that no longer serve us? And what happens when we choose to live by something different?

This podcast is my exploration of those questions. Through conversations with historians, ecologists, and valuescientists, I dig into the forces that shape our world and uncover the values that might lead us toward something better. Not the ones we were handed, but the ones we choose for ourselves.

If you’ve ever felt the quiet discomfort of following a path that doesn’t quite fit—this podcast is for you.

Let’s re-examine the rules together.